


rumors and hearsay are not admissable evidence in a court of law

by nanrea



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol, Dialogue Heavy, Drinking & Talking, F/F, One-Sided Attraction, Other, PS can some other people get on the Normandy NPCs being friends and talking to each other thing?, Panic Attacks, Pre-Relationship, Robot Kink, So much talking, Talking, Voice Kink, after me2/before me3, all the drink mixes are real btw, and I don't want to have to write it all myself, and I need more of it, because i love it, damn do I love dialogue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-01
Updated: 2018-03-08
Packaged: 2019-03-25 18:33:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 12,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13840578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nanrea/pseuds/nanrea
Summary: But in the court of public opinion, all evidence is admissible.Samantha Traynor knows three things about Commander Shepard: she saved the Citadel, she went rogue to save the Terminus Systems, and was currently being held by Alliance command for the destruction of the Alpha Relay.By the end of the retrofit, she knows a lot more, but it's still not enough to prepare her for actually meeting a legend.Or: seven times Samantha hears about Shepard vs the first time she actually meets her.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [zenstrike](https://archiveofourown.org/users/zenstrike/gifts).



> I hope you like dialogue.

Samantha Traynor gaped in awe at the vessel dry docked in bay 42 as her new CO, Lieutenant Adams, stopped near the entrance. The sleek, stylish lines of an SR class Alliance freighter were unmistakable, and the name of the craft was iconic. The colors, all wrong.

The _Normandy SR-2_ , all done up in Cerberus colors. Samantha could have wept at the sight.

“Alright, Traynor, welcome to your new assignment,” Adams said. “You’ve been assigned to sweep her for Cerberus bugs and update the tech to Alliance standard. Once the ship is cleared, you and I will partner to integrate any remaining and cleared Cerberus tech with Alliance upgrades. She won’t be vanilla; the SR-1 was already outside the norm for Alliance vessels, and with her stealth systems, standard issue isn’t going to work.” He smiled at her, crows feet crinkling the corners of his eyes. “That’s why we’re bringing you aboard. You’ve shown some real skill in the labs with innovation, and if there’s anything we need for this project, it’s someone who’s willing to think beyond Alliance regs and adapt to the situation.”

He paused, and she nodded quickly, then gave an awkward salute. “Um, yes, sir, thank you for the opportunity,” she said.

Adams chuckled. “Don’t worry too much about formality at this point. Trust me, you won’t get much from our guest of honor.”

As if on cue, the large garage door leading outside the dry dock opened, and an Alliance shuttle coasted in to land softly by the Normandy’s cargo bay door.

“That’ll be them, now,” Adams said. “Cortez will be working on getting the armory sorted and moved to the cargo bay, and of course, we’ll need Joker to reprogram the VI.”

He started walking to the shuttle at a brisk pace, and Samantha hurried after him. “Excuse me, sir,” she huffed as they reached the now open hatch of the shuttle. “Why do we need someone else to work with the VI?”

“Well, according to Joker-”

“She won’t respond to anyone but me.”

A scruffy man in a beat up hat pushed himself laboriously to his feet inside the shuttle. Flanking him were two guards, but Samantha honestly wasn’t sure they were even necessary as the pilot limped down the shallow ramp towards Adams.

“Joker, good to see you,” Adams said with a grin and offering out a hand.

“Adams? Is that you? Son of a bitch,” Joker answered, sticking out both arms to shake the proffered hand. Samantha was surprised to realize his wrists were loosely cuffed together. “Haven’t seen you since Shepard’s memorial ceremony.”

“Yeah,” Adams said, face suddenly strained with regret. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you when Dr. Chakwas contacted me, Joker. I just. It was too good to be true, you know?”

“Look, Adams, I really can’t blame you for not believing she was back from the dead. I saw her die, believe me, I know. But hey, you’re here now, and I honestly can’t think of anyone better to be leading the retrofit of my baby.”

“Thanks, Joker, that means a lot, coming from you.” Adams grinned, and clapped Joker with extreme delicacy on the shoulder.

The shuttle’s pilot and a third man with the everpresent slight static charge of a biotic then joined them, and introductions went around again: Steve Cortez, in charge of the cargo bay and armory retrofits, Campbell and Westmoreland, Joker’s guards, Samantha of course, Adams, a couple others, and Kaidan Alenko, the liaison officer between the retrofit crew and Admiral Anderson.

Samantha had never been around so many bonafide heroes in her entire life.

The tension between the three survivors of the original _Normandy_ was palpable as they entered the ship, especially between Joker and Alenko. Samantha could see the pilot shooting the biotic dirty looks every time he said something, and Alenko was studiously avoiding even looking at Joker, while Adams attempted to ease tensions by maintaining the same even, jovial tone for both.

It was a relief to finally be left alone in the CIC for her initial assessment of the communications and navigational software.

This was going to be an intense project, she could tell at the end of her sweep. Even a cursory examination revealed several components she was certain were bugs, a whole bunch more that would have been easy to modify into spyware while still outwardly functioning as they ought, and she was certain that basically all the software would have to be overwritten with new code to eliminate any risks of viruses or other malware.

It was a relief when Adams finally interrupted her to invite her to lunch. The bright lights and white paint everywhere that Cerberus had installed throughout the ship were giving her a migraine. She was far too used to the energy saving low light of Alliance standard, apparently, and was happy to leave it behind for the Alliance Vancouver Dockyards cafeteria.

She settled across the table from him with a sad looking chicken sandwich and a brightly colored can of Caffeine and B vitamin Quad Kick. “So . . . “ she said. “You served on the first _Normandy_ with Shepard?”

“That I did, Traynor,” Adams acknowledged with a rueful quirk of his lips. He sipped at the black sludge they called coffee here. "I imagine you've got questions, huh." 

"Yes, well," Samantha looked down, fighting back a blush. "If it's not too rude for me to ask."

"Go ahead," he said, drizzling dressing over his slightly wilted salad. "Ask away."

"Alright." She decided to go straight for the obvious. “What was she like?”

“Shepard? Damn, how do you describe a woman like Shepard? Fierce and confident, of course, and compelling; when she says something you just have to listen. Amazingly persuasive, too.” He sighed, eyes unfocused as he used his fork to spear a cherry tomato. "Could convince you the moon was going to fall from the sky, and then make you believe she could stop it from happening. Make you believe you could stop it too, if you just followed her lead." He smirked. "She never loses sight of her mission, and uses every tool in her toolbox to get the job done, in the end. Even the enemy, as it turns out. Never thought she'd join Cerberus, after the shit we saw in the Terminus, but, well. Needs must, I guess." He glanced over at her. "That answer your question?" 

“I meant the original _Normandy_ , actually,” Samantha said with a grin. "Though that does answer my next question."

Adams laughed. "Well, Traynor, nothing like her, either." He shook his head, and took a bight of his salad. He looked thoughtful as he chewed, then continued. "Combined turian and human design aesthetics turned out to be different from both parent designs, as you can see in the SR-2. The SR-1 was pretty similar overall, to be honest, just a bit smaller. There was less compartmentalization in terms of areas. Space was more limited so you had Engineering stuffed down with the cargo, and the bridge and crew deck were barely separated. Way more cramped, too, no gunnery, no bunks, just sleep pods for the regular crew, captain's quarters right next to the head. Which was co-ed by the way. Definitely no lounges or anything like that on the old girl."

Samantha nodded thoughtfully. "I suppose a fully stocked bar is not standard on Alliance frigates."

"Not at all." He shook his head. "Makes it hard to tell if Cerberus was designing a war ship or a yacht."

She snorted, and let the conversation go onto the findings they'd both made so far and preliminary lists for what would need to be altered or replaced (basically everything) and what parts would work best for which components. The rest of the day went similar to the first half, and by the time Samantha stumbled back to her temporary berth in the quarters near the dockyard, she was exhausted. Her mind swirled with the amount of work needed, but her last thought before she passed out wasn't about the ship.

It was about her captain. 

Shepard. She must have been incredible to have inspired so much loyalty. Samantha wondered if she'd ever get the chance to meet her. Probably not: the commander was under house arrest and awaiting trial, according to the news feeds, and Samantha's job kept her far from active duty in any case. Once this retrofit was done, she'd go back to the labs, and any chance of crossing paths would be lost.

It was too bad. Shepard was definitely her type.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so basically how this'll work is every chapter would massively fail the Bechtel test if the Bechtel test was about conversations between two characters always somehow being about Shepard. Hope you like it.


	2. Chapter 2

Initial assessments had been completed weeks ago, and the gutting had begun. The equipment room had been stripped, and Samantha felt confident that the techs working below her could handle the CIC, but the conference room was another matter. Quantum entanglement communicators were still fairly experimental, an innovation rarely used by those who were confident in the comm buoys connected to the mass effect relay system.

It took someone deeply, deeply paranoid, Samantha decided, to figure out a way to communicate across the galaxy without relying on mass effect technology.

The equipment was very delicate, at any rate, and while the other techs were competent for standard equipment, Samantha was the only one who had any experience with experimental communications technology.

This room was the reason they’d brought her onto the project, so this room she was going to handle personally.

Time to get to work.

“Joker, can you have EDI run through her diagnostics of the Cerberus QEC, please?” Samantha called down the CIC deck. “I’m going to be working in the old conference room, and I could use some guidance on what equipment can be salvaged.”

“Sure, sure,” Joker called back. She could see him wave from the pilot’s chair, and Westmoreland, standing next to him, gave a thumbs up.

She waved back, and went to the conference room through Mordin’s old lab, which had already been stripped down to bare walls. EDI’s interface hologram popped up immediately as she entered.

“Joker has instructed me to give you any information you require about the contents of this room,” the VI’s synthesized voice said. “Please let me know how I may be of assistance.”

EDI ran down a list of the equipment under the conference table and how to access it as Samantha got the table to sink into the floor and opened the access console to the quantum entanglement communicator. One portion rose out of the floor where the center area of the table converted to a QEC platform, the other half lowering from the ceiling where the image scanner had been located. The whole setup was incredibly awkward, and Samantha felt like a contortionist as she stretched to reach the various components.

Through it all, EDI kept up a steady monologue about the parts she was handling. At the moment, Samantha was trying to reach the quantum fluctuation inducer, hidden behind the base image projector and what was clearly a Cerberus listening device.

EDI’s voice was. Distracting her. In a good way. “That voice is so sexy. I kind of want to pin it against the wall and run my tongue along its collar bone,” she said offhandedly as she put down her screwdriver, pleased to have finally, finally gotten the thing lose enough that she could probably just pull the bug out while hopefully not damaging anything else.

“Quantum entanglement communication relies on both atoms being in complete sync, and given that the oscillation on this unit has stopped, it is safe to assume that the connection on the other end has been severed. The unit may be salvaged, but it will require replacing the quantum interface and installing new entangled units.”

“That’s, mm, good to know.” Samantha pushed the console up into the ceiling a bit to knock lose the wiring at the top of the unit.

The VI went silent for a moment, then said, “It is recommended that any alteration to the projector be done without cracking the containment glass.”

She caught up the wiring, and with a deft tug, pulled it loose. “Not a problem,” she said with a smirk. “The glass is still intact.” She studied the wiring dangling from the other side of the console. “Fuck, is that another bug? These things are everywhere.”

The VI’s projection flickered. “The image scanner will need to be completely removed to also remove the data collector attached to the lens.”

“Damn.” That was going to be a lot tougher to reach.

Still, with EDI providing a surprising amount of information on the location of Cerberus listening devices and other, less insidious hardware, Samantha was able to strip down a great deal of the equipment.

Heh, strip, she thought.

“Mmm, I could roll around in satin sheets with that voice . . . “ Samantha rubbed her legs together as she leaned over the console, trying to reach the wiring that controlled the image projector. _Grab it by the hair and nibble my way down its back_ . Her fingers finally slid over the delicate machinery. _Give it a tug_ \-- with a gasp, she fell backwards, the tangled wires of another Cerberus control chip dangling triumphantly from her fist. “Yes!”

“Traynor are you getting off on this?”

Samantha shrieked and jerked around to glare at Joker, smirking at her from the door to Mordin’s lab. “No! I just--”

“Hey, I get it.” He waved the hand not propping him up nonchalantly. “EDI has a very attractive voice, it’s like, the only attractive feature about her.”

“Ugh.” She tossed the bug aside and crossed her arms. “Where are your guards, anyway? I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to be wandering the ship.” She’d had several run ins with the pilot over the past weeks, and his snarky presence was at times a relief, but occasionally an annoyance.

Like right now, when he’d maybe, um, overheard some things she’d prefer no one else know about.

“What, you think I’m going to sabotage the _Normandy_?” Joker snorted. “She’s my baby.”

“I’m just saying security’s been getting a little lax.” She gestured at him. “You’re not even being cuffed anymore, for pete’s sake.”

“Yeah, well, you’ve got your delicate machinery no one else can touch, and I’ve got mine. No one’s altering the flight control deck without my oversight.” He huffed and crossed his arms. “Besides, I didn’t ditch them; Westmoreland is hitting the can and Campbell is doing a sandwich run. You want in? We can call her to add on an order if you want.” He limped his way back to the CIC, adding, “I’m meeting Adams and Cortez on the crew deck, by the way, if you want to escort me and make sure I don’t touch the wrong buttons.”

“Um, sure,” she said, and followed him to the elevator. “So, um . . . you really love the _Normandy_ , huh. Is, is that why you decided to join Cerberus?”

Joker sighed as he hit the call button. “You really want to know?” His face was expressionless, but there was tension in his shoulders.

Samantha nodded. “Yes, I mean. She’s a beautiful ship, and honestly given their resources, if it wasn’t for their human only politics even I would be tempted to, um, you know.”

He looked down, frowning. For a long minute, she wasn’t sure he was going to answer.

“No,” he said. “It wasn’t why I left the Alliance.”

The elevator finally dinged and opened, interrupting him. Joker was silent in the time it took for them to board and for the doors to close.

Finally, he continued. “It was because of Shepard. I mean, yeah, flying again was great, but . . . after Shepard died, the Alliance and the Council completely ignored all the evidence about the Reapers, and blamed everything on the geth.” He looked at her, the most serious she’d ever seen him. “She’s not wrong about the Reapers. Cerberus was the only organization that took her seriously about them, and when they told me they were going to bring her back, showed me . . . It’s not a fight I could have turned my back on.”

Samantha stared at him, struck by how serious the mood had become. She wasn’t certain about the Reaper issue herself: it just seemed so far fetched. But Joker clearly believed, and had proved he was willing to follow Shepard into hell itself, support her in any way he could.

The ding of the elevator finally arriving at the crew deck stopped their conversation, and in between getting Campbell on the line and a sandwich ordered, listening to Joker begging Adams to bump up the priority of upgrading elevator speed, and comparing notes with Cortez about how many bugs they'd found in removing the equipment from the lab and armory, Samantha was distracted from her increasing curiosity about one topic in particular.

Just what sort of woman was Shepard, anyway?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't resist adding in the dirty talk Samantha and EDI discuss during the Citadel DLC. keep it in your pants, Sammy, jeez.


	3. Chapter 3

Samantha didn't have much reason to interact with the official Alliance Liaison, partly because Alenko was often away performing other duties, and partly because she frankly didn't have much reason to interact with the man. It had been well over two months since the start of the retrofit, and she'd seen him in the CIC a total of five times.

There had been a great deal done in those months, though. Virtually all of the equipment installed by Cerberus had been stripped, examined, and purged before the salvageable parts were replaced. The terrorist organization had clearly spared no expense in the creation of the ship, and a full ninety percent of her original installations were able to be recouped. The front half of the deck was nearly complete and reeked of fresh paint. The armory had been removed from the command deck, and the lab utterly demolished. A wall had been built over the door to the old armory, and Samantha was in the middle of overseeing the installation of a new entanglement interface and a whole new suite of computers and monitoring stations that would effectively turn the _Normandy_ into a mobile command center.

However, this part of the command deck retrofit was on hold until those new quantum entanglements could be created, and so Samantha had been recruited to do a sweep of the rest of the ship for any other listening devices or spyware. 

She had started with the cabin built into the loft area of the ship. According to Joker, that had been Shepard's quarters, where she had 'killed just a ridiculous amount of fish,' which was more information than Samantha had wanted, frankly. There hadn't been any fish up there when Samantha entered, however, and the cabin looked like it had been subject to a hasty search at some point. An overturned hamster cage sat on one shelf, the bed was stripped of its sheets, and several drawers had been left open in the small office area.

It was an incredible luxury, she noted. Once again, Cerberus really went over the top in designing this ship. From what Joker and Adams said, Samantha wouldn't think the Commander would be one easily swayed by such excess, but she did wonder if Cerberus had thought it would be an influence, regardless.

Whatever the case, she was starting her sweep with this room. The retrofit crew hadn't been up here yet to repaint, so everything was original to the first build, and there was a stray Cerberus logo still affixed here and there. Overview scans showed that at some point someone else had already swept the room for bugs: all the really obvious spots were empty, but scrapes in a couple locations showed where one had been probably removed. She wondered if that had been the retrofit crew, or even Shepard herself. The Commander was, by all accounts, fully capable of doing such a search herself.

Samantha had a few tricks up her sleeve that someone who didn't spend all their time in a lab coming up with creative device optimization might not think of, though, and managed to find several weak points that she took note of for the retrofit crew to remove before moving on.

And, in a drawer of the desk, face down, she found a picture frame. The rest of the room had been devoid of any of the Commander's personal effects. She could only imagine that this had been missed because the dark color of the frame nearly perfectly matched the finish on the interior of the drawer.

Flipping it over, she was surprised to see Major Alenko staring back up at her.

Oh boy, that's awkward.

But not, she soon found out, not the most awkward thing that could happen to her.

She was in the crawlspace that lead from the Command deck lab to the crew deck when she overheard the man himself in the central cabin, arguing with Joker of all people. She was contemplating crawling back up the ladder or maybe just dying right there when she realized what they were arguing about.

"Yeah, well, listen, Alenko, it was your choice," she heard Joker shout. "You're the one who didn't listen, you're the one who let her leave instead of joining us when she made the offer."

"Joining _Cerberus_ , Joker. You know what those bastards have done, you, fuck! They, they killed Admiral Kahoku, that squad of marines, did th-the thing with the thresher maws, you know about all of that, how could, how could either of you possibly have decided joining them was a good idea?"

"Oh, come on, you know exactly why. The council was doing jack and shit! You should know, too! Fuck, you were on Horizon when the collectors attacked-" and that was a memory Samantha didn't want to revisit while trapped in a crawl space, again. She had to get out of here. She didn't even bother trying to be quiet as she crawled as fast as she could to the closest ladder.

Her breath was coming out in labored gasps when she made it to free air, wider space. She slid down the ladder into the life support room, throat catching in the much dryer air. She bent and braced her hands on her knees, feeling stupid as the blind panic began to fade.

How had she forgotten that Alenko had been stationed on Horizon? Her parents had even talked about him during her visit. She'd used commercial transport to get there, but had left on the military transport that had come to pick him up after the attack, for heaven's sake. She'd never actually met him in the shuffle, since the brass had called him aboard the day prior for debrief, and had only extended an invitation for a ride back to Earth when records showed her among the survivors.

It had been a bad time, and she avoided thinking about it as much as possible. It was no wonder she hadn't made the connection until now.

It was quiet in the main cabin.

With great trepidation, Samantha opened the door to life support and tried to creep stealthily to the elevator. 

And then stopped. Alenko was standing at the counter of the mess and staring right at her, Joker peering around the corner while seated at the table.

Samantha plastered on a smile that felt very, very fake. "Hello," she said. "Just doing a sweep for bugs. Um."

It must not have been very convincing. Alenko frowned. "Are you feeling alright?" he asked. "You look, uh."

"You look like you've had the shit scared out of you," Joker said frankly. "What's up, Traynor?"

"I, uh, I." There was no easy way around this, and she couldn't think straight, quite frankly. She just decided to spit it out. "I'm sorry. I was in the crawlspace, um, and I heard you mention Horizon and the Collector attack, and, ah, had a bad reaction."

Joker looked a little ill at that. "Yeah, that's, that's not good times, that crawlspace."

"Why'd you, what, panic?" Alenko asked, clearly torn between concern and curiosity. He too, looked a little drawn.

"I, well, I was actually on Horizon when the . . . the attack happened," Samantha said, clenching her hands. "I, it. Um."

"Holy shit, seriously?" Joker said.

"Wow," Alenko muttered. "I don't remember meeting you, but, I mean. It was a pretty decent sized colony. You, uh, you doing alright?"

"Oh! Yes! I'm fine." She waved her hands around kind of vaguely. "I mean, my parents came out fine, and I was only trapped for a little while, it's all, it's all fine! We're all fine, everything's fine."

"Good, good," Alenko said. "I'm glad. Sorry, I have to go."

With that, he set his coffee mug on the counter and strode past her, to the elevator. She stood, awkwardly, eyes darting between him and Joker as he waited the minute for the elevator to show up. None of them said anything until the doors closed behind him.

She turned to Joker. "I am so sorry," she said. "I-"

"It's fine," he interrupted. "Certainly I've walked into worse with you," he added with a lascivious wink.

"We're not going to talk about that," she snapped but with a grin to show she was playing along, but then sank into the chair across from him, feeling drained. "That was so awkward, though."

"Yeah, don't worry about it," Joker said. "I'm sure we'll patch it up or whatever at some point. What's a little distrust between friends?"

"Usually a deal breaker," Samantha said dryly. "But I suppose you both have your reasons and all that."

"Damn right," Joker said.

She continued her sweep after Joker was collected by an irate Westmoreland, who chastised him for letting his escort leave without calling her. Her sweep of the crew deck revealed that whoever had swept the port side lounge had been extremely thorough and skilled, and had also apparently stolen all the best liquor without taking the bottles. The starboard side's inhabitant had apparently not bothered to look for any monitoring devices, while the crew cabin itself and both bathrooms had only minimal surveillance. The First Officer's cabin was stripped down to the plating, and the life support room was also pretty clean. 

There was a nasty note about touching the calibrations of the main guns and threatening bodily harm to anyone who tried in the forward battery. Samantha had a hard time telling how serious the writer had been, but whoever they were, they managed to do almost as good a job as the port lounge inhabitant of getting rid of bugs. 

The server room and the medical cabin were also fairly clean, and she noted that there was another crawlspace leading from there to somewhere below deck. She glared at the hole in the floor, and checked her omnitool for the time.

Unfortunately, though it was late enough that she probably couldn't get another level done today, she would have enough time to do another crawlspace.

 _Suck it up, buttercup_ , the voice of her drill sergeant from basic shouted in her head, and she made her way through the tunnel between decks.

These spaces, she found, were not particularly rich in listening devices.

The path lead to that weird storage space below the engineering deck. It was also, it turned out, where Alenko had rushed off to.

He was staring at the floor and looked deep in thought as Samantha dropped down from the crawl space. He jumped and lit with a biotic nimbus as her feet hit the floor. They found themselves in a staring contest for the second time that day.

"Holy shit, you are dropping in everywhere today," he said, the blue glow dissipating. "Finding anything interesting?"

"Um, well, whoever lived in the portside lounge had expensive taste in liquor," she answered. "Also, whoever the gunnery officer was, they were very protective of their calibrations." 

Alenko chuckled. "Listen," he said. "I'm sorry about earlier."

Samantha cocked her head. "For what?" she asked. 

"For leaving so suddenly, I guess. It was, I don't know, kind of rude maybe?"

"Oh, oh no, sir, really. It's fine, I'd rather. Um. Let's just forget the whole thing happened and never talk about it again." She wrung her hands. "I would prefer to, at least."

"That's," Alenko's brow wrinkled. "That's not a healthy method of dealing with things, you know."

"I know." She stared down at the floor.

And jumped back with a shriek when a rodent ran out of a pile of equipment and shot across the floor.

Alenko jumped back too, shouting "What? What?" and glowing blue again, head whipping around looking for a threat.

"Oh god, oh, I'm sorry," Samantha said, and started laughing. "There's a, there's a-"

"What?"

"A hamster!" She giggled, feeling ridiculous for over reacting. "I, oh, I think I know where it came from, too. I'm sorry for scaring you, sir."

"A hamster?" he said, disbelief tinging his voice. "There's a hamster down here?" He started staring down at the floor and backing up. "Why is there a hamster on the ship?"

"I don't, I don't know," she got out between giggles. "Oh gosh, it's been too long a day for this, Major Alenko. I think I need to go raid that bar upstairs after this."

He smirked. "I'd agree, but alcohol doesn't do much for biotics."

"Alright." Samantha turned to leave, but then remembered that picture she'd found in the loft. Well, it's not like things can get too much more awkward, right? She decided to go for it. She turned back and said, "Oh, by the way, I hope this isn't too personal, um, there, there was a picture of you in the loft? I was, I guess I was just curious about, if maybe, do you know why there'd be a picture of, of you up there?"

Alenko was silent, eyes wide.

"I, um, sorry, gosh, I really stuck my foot in it this time, I'm just going to go get blackout drunk now and forget this ever happened," she said all in a rush, and backed up toward the stairs. 

"Wait! No, um, the loft was where Shepard's quarters were, wasn't it." He wasn't asking. He clearly already knew. "Wow, she. I. Huh." He shook himself off. "I'm going to need that drink after all. You mind if I join you?"

"Uh, I guess not," she said.

It was another long and awkward ride up in the elevator to reach the crew deck, now empty of anyone. This late in the afternoon, most of the techs had already left, and the crew deck was a low priority at this stage regardless.

Samantha felt her bar tending habits kick in as they investigated the contents of the lounge. Alenko seemed content to just pick up bottles at random, reading the labels and putting them back after a cautious swirl of the contents. Samantha selected her picks with an expert eye. Getting a biotic drunk? Difficult but not impossible. She ushered him back to the other side of the bar and began lining up some glasses.

He eyed her choices with trepidation. "Honestly I'm surprised this stuff is still here," he commented. "Fully stocked bars aren't exactly Alliance standard. I'd have thought this would be the first to go."

"Me too," Samantha confessed. "But the crew deck is low priority compared to the CIC and the cargo bay. We should be thankful most of the techs never even bother to come to this deck for lunch." With deft hands, she pulled together the parts necessary for a mixed drink, dumping cinnamon schnapps, whisky, tequila, vodka, Southern Comfort and an energy shot into two glasses. She pushed one toward the major and said, "Cheers."

"Cheers," he echoed, and downed it. Immediately he made a choking noise. "God, fuck, what is this," he asked, looking disgusted.

"Vomit juice," she said straight faced, and took a drink of her own. Ahh, worse than she remembered. Perfect. "Another?"

"Uh, no, maybe something else?" He pushed the empty glass back over to her. "Something that doesn't live up to its name so well, maybe. You know how to mix a Cosmic South?"

"Hmm," Samantha scanned the liquor bar. "Unfortunately I don't see any lychee liqueur, but we've got everything else for it."

"Nah," he smirked. "That's the best part. How about a Dead Bastard?"

"Oh, no problem, there," she said, and quickly threw together the brandy, gin, rum, and lime juice in his glass, then topped it off with ginger ale. 

"You forgot the bitters," he said, but waver her away. "It's fine, it's fine." He drank that, too, taking longer than with the first drink, but still finishing it in one pull.

"Hmm, I realize biotics have a higher metabolism and can process alcohol faster, but maybe you should slow down a little," Samantha said, feeling a bit of concern about how determined Alenko seemed in getting drunk.

He frowned. "Don't worry about it." He studied his glass. "How about a battering ram? You know that one?"

She studied him, then nodded reluctantly. "Simple. One part vodka, one part tequila, fill with an energy drink. Pick your poison?" She ducked down and looked in the mini fridge below the bar. "There's grape caffeine quad kicker, twencen cherry explosion, or classic Red Bull down here."

"Let's go classic Red Bull," he answered. Silently, she mixed him the drink, then took a pull of her vomit juice.

He drank this one more slowly, weaving a bit on the stool. They were silent as they took their time finishing their drinks.

Finally he set his glass back down. "Shepard and I . . . "

She looked at him, deeply curious.

He sighed. "We . . . were dating. On the SR-1."

"Oh," she said. She knew Alliance regs regarding fraternization as well as the next person: frowned upon, but generally ignored if it doesn't affect the work.

"Then, well . . . nothing is eternal, I guess."

Without really thinking about it, she began mixing another drink; orange flavored vodka, apricot brandy, lemon juice, orange juice.

He leaned his head against the counter, sighing. "She died, and I . . . I tried to move on. Seeing her on Horizon was  . . . bad. She let me think she was dead for two years." He sat up and took the drink she silently slid over to him. "Liara and Joker both say she actually _was_ dead but, come on. People don't come back from the dead, do they?"

Samantha was silent. There was so much pain, loss, betrayal in his voice that she couldn't come up with an adequate response. Their relationship had clearly broke bad.

Certainly she knew what that felt like. When things with T'Suza had broke bad, their competitive natures getting in the way of their romance, the fallout had been quite terrible, T'Suza's formerly playful condescension turning into vindictive snobbery, Samantha taking every competition as a personal battle to prove her self worth. It had been terrible.

But, well, neither of them had died and then come back, so she guessed the parallels weren't completely, uh, parallel. Shit. She should probably not drink anymore. She could already feel her lips getting tingly and numb.

She pushed his glass over to him, and poured a little Red Bull in her own glass, filling the rest up with ginger ale. "I don't know if they can come back from the dead or not," Samantha said quietly. "Although . . . I, I've never met Shepard, obviously. But from what I've heard about her, if the mission, if it was required, she would do almost anything to complete it, from what I've heard."

"Hmmph." Alenko took a sip of his drink. "I don't. The old Shepard wouldn't have sold herself out, is what I think, but maybe . . . I don't know her as well as I thought I did, or something." He fixed his gaze on the wall behind her. "She's . . . I've seen her a couple times, you know, since her arrest. She's still as focused as ever, on the reapers, on saving the galaxy. Maybe that's who she's always been, and I just couldn't see it."

They contemplated this in silence, together. Samantha could feel the thoughts in her head growing muzzy even though her buzz wasn't getting stronger, and sighed. Alenko seemed to take that as a cue, pushing his own glass back across the counter and standing up, swaying only a little.

"Listen, sorry for, for dumping all that on you," he muttered. "I know we like, barely know each other, and you've never even met Shepard, I guess? I'm sorry, seriously."

"It's fine," she said. "I mean, I did bring it up, I guess."

"Nah, nah." He waved a hand. "I better cut myself off and head out, though, gotta be up to Alliance HQ tomorrow and report to Anderson. Listen though, we should try this again sometime, under better circumstances." He paused, then added, "The mixing weird drinks thing, not the talking about dead ex's thing."

"Yeah, sure," she said. "I don't have any of those anyways."

He nodded, stumbling toward the door. "Great, good. Keep it that way. Thanks, Traynor." He hit the door panel, then looked back at her. "Seriously. It helped to talk it out, a little. Even if you basically have no involvement at all. I appreciate it. Later."

With that, he staggered out the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tbh because I like both Ashley and Kaidan a lot, I picked the Virmire survivor by flipping a coin, and when it came up Kaidan I couldn't resist that bit of relationship drama re: Horizon  
> I can't imagine Joker would let that slide without saying something at some point.
> 
> at any rate, all the drinks named up there are real drinks!


	4. Chapter 4

Four months into the retrofit, Samantha felt like she lived more aboard the ship than in her quarters. Long hours were spent installing, repairing, testing, and upgrading, then retesting communications arrays, navigational equipment, software suites, and data displays throughout the ship. She spent the majority of her time in what has become dubbed the War Room, where the most sophisticated of the data mining and communications equipment will live. She was still waiting on paired QEC equipment for the Citadel and Arcturus, as well as from the flagships of several of Earth’s fleets, but the units for Earth and for Hacket’s flagship had been billed as top priority, and were already installed.

Today Campbell found her half buried under the center console of the War room, adding a state of the art solid light display for the haptic interface. She heard a light knocking on the door and nearly hit her head pulling herself out.

“Lunch is here, Traynor,” Campbell said with a grin, offering her a hand to help stand up.

“Thank you,” she groaned. “I didn’t realise it had gotten this late.”

Lunch was almost always down on the crew deck now that it had been refurbished. That had so far been the quickest flip of the retrofit; basically just a paint job and a systems update for the battery and life support.

The battery had been completed just that morning, and that’s what Joker and Adams were talking about when she and Campbell arrived.

“I’m just saying, Garrus is going to flip his shit if he ever goes in there again, Greg. And I, for one, hope I’m here to see it,” Joker was saying.

Westmoreland, sitting beside him, pushed a take out bag across the table to Samantha and Campbell, but kept her eyes on Joker and Adams. Despite having been on his guard detail for nearly five months, the young private still seemed slightly in awe of anyone from the original _Normandy_ crew, and would listen avidly every time Joker and Adams got into one of their good natured arguments.

“I still can’t believe Shepard managed to talk both Garrus and Tali into coming back,” Adams said. “You know, I could use Tali down on the engine deck. Getting such a massive core into a small frigate, on top of the heat sink for the stealth systems is creating some real headaches.”

“Oh, yeah, Gabby and Kenneth were always bitching about this, that and the other down there,” Joker replied. “Got Shepard to buy some parts for them, too. Smart kids. Too bad Anderson didn’t listen to me when I told him to bring them on for the retrofit too.”

Adams shook his head, and Cortez, sitting on his other side, said, “I can’t imagine it would look good to have even more ex-Cerberus crew working on this. It was hard enough getting you on board.”

“And haven’t I been just invaluable?” Joker smirked.

Adams rolled his eyes. “Sure, sure. Joker, are you sure you’re not doing something with that VI that keeps me from reprogramming it?”

“Greg, I swear, I know jack and shit about VI programming. If EDI’s still not responding to you, I don’t know what to tell you. She works fine for Sam, doesn’t she?” he winked at her with a shit eating grin.

“Oh god, not this again. But, no, I haven’t had any problems with her. Maybe it’s the programming language?” she asked.

“What do you think I am, some kind of newb?” Adams groaned, stabbing his fork into his fried rice. “It’s not that. It’s almost like she’s not a VI at all, but come on, even Cerberus isn’t crazy enough to make a full AI, are they?”

Joker snorted into his sesame chicken, clearly amused. “Well, if they were, I doubt Shepard would have liked it very much. I know I wouldn’t have liked it, hah.” His smile turned sly. “But you know, Shepard did bring a live geth on board, so you never know.”

“What?” Adams said. “Now I know you’re pulling my leg. A geth? Come on.”

Cortez shook his head, expertly loading lo mein onto his chopsticks. “I’ve heard a lot of wild stories about Shepard, but the idea that she would allow a live geth on her ship is really just. Unbelievable.”

“Believe it!” Joker said. “Its name is Legion. She even got it onto the Citadel. Security didn’t even notice it. ‘Geth do not intentionally infiltrate.’” Here he clearly was trying to imitate a robot voice. “Ahh, that feed was wild. No one on the entire station even _noticed_. I owed Shepard a hundred credits after that stunt.”

“Oh come on,” Adams said, shaking his head. “Now I know you’re lying. No way.”

“Yes way! It’s in the official debrief, if you don’t believe me.” Joker laughed. “You can even ask Tali! Shepard even managed to get those two to get along! Even I have a hard time believing that part.”

“Ok,” Adams said, putting his fork down. “Ok. This, right here? Bullshit. I call bullshit.”

“No, shit, we can just ask EDI!” Joker continued, shoulders shaking. “A VI can’t lie! Hey, EDI?”

“Yes, Joker,” the VI responded immediately.

“EDI, tell Greg about the geth, he doesn’t believe me.”

“Yes, Joker,” EDI said. “Legion was brought aboard after the successful retrieval of the reaper IFF code, during which he played an instrumental part in securing the reaper core. After his reactivation, Shepard allowed him to stay aboard for several more missions, including the assault on the Collector base. During his time aboard, he also proved to be an active massive multiplayer online game player, with the most hours logged playing _Galaxy of Fantasy_ and the _Fleet and Flotilla_ interactive cross species romance simulator.”

There was silence around the table, even Joker looking kind of dazed by this bit of information, before he snorted and started giggling. “Wait, EDI, wait,” he stuttered. “I have to know, who did he romance in Fleet and Flotilla?”

“His character was unable to romance any of the options, due to his extremely low score.”

Joker cackled. “Oh god, oh man, that’s, that’s too good, EDI, why did you never tell me this? EDI, fuck, this is golden, oh god.”

“This information was never particularly vital to your duties as Flight Lieutenant,” Edi said. “In addition, you never asked.”

Samantha wasn’t sure, because, after all, VI, but she thought she caught a slight tone of rebuke in EDI’s voice.

Adams continued to look completely gobsmacked. “She really did it? She really brought a geth on board? And worked with it? Holy shit.”

Cortez was shaking his head. “Of all the stories I’ve heard about Commander Shepard, that takes the cake.”

Beside her, Campbell broke out of her shock and said, “Wait, _Galaxy of Fantasy?_ I love that game! What did he play as?”

“Nerd,” Westmoreland muttered with a fond smile, kicking at her under the table and hitting Samantha instead.

“Legion played as an Ardat-Yakshi necromancer,” EDI answered, with, Samantha noticed, no prompting from Joker. “His character had reached level six hundred and twelve by the time he left the ship.”

“Ah, a rope ‘em and ride ‘em type, huh,” Campbell said. “Surprising choice, actually, considering all the sex murder that class uses to raise their thralls.”

Joker made a choking noise on his rice. “God,” he said, “that’s nasty, Campbell, why is that a thing?”

“Blame the game developers!” she answered, lifting her hands in surrender before shoving another egg roll in her mouth.

“You will also be amused to note that Legion received several mod warnings for VI usage which he was able to successfully challenge and overturn,” EDI added, unprompted.

Adams shook his head. “Holy shit,” he repeated. “Holy shit.”

Cortez shook his head. “It’s hard to believe Shepard would willingly allow an AI aboard her ship at all, let alone a geth.”

“AI aren’t automatically evil just because they’re AI,” Adams responded. “I’d say it’s the perception that they can be a threat that does the real harm.”

“Oh boy, you know what makes a good lunch conversation?” Joker interrupted. “The ethics of AI. Can we go back to talking about how you can play as a literally mind blowing sex murderer in a major MMO, please?”

Adams shoveled the rest of his rice into his mouth. “You kids have fun with that,” he said, standing up. “I’ve got to get back down to engineering. But listen, if you can remember what those two Cerberus engineers did about the venting,” he added, addressing Joker, “let me know, ok? Or get EDI to tell me, whatever. Later, kids.”

Cortez got up, too, muttering something about finalizing vendor authorizations for the armory.

There was a brief silence after they left, broken only by the sound of Samantha slurping her wonton soup noisily to cut the tension.

“I have to ask,” Westmoreland said after a moment. “Did Shepard really take on thresher maws on foot?”

“Yes,” Joker said, completely serious. “Yes, she did.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was my favorite chapter to write, because I love Legion and his incredible shadow broker dossier


	5. Chapter 5

Five and a half months in, and they were nearing the end. The command deck was very nearly completed; the CIC fully finished, the war room only requiring a few more tweaks, the lab transformed into a conference room for dignitaries with sound proofing glass, a security room added at Joker’s, oddly enough, suggestion. All that was left was installing the last of the QEC blocks.

The loft, a low priority, had been finished just the day before. Mostly, as far as Samantha knew, it just needed to be stripped and repainted. She would be reinstalling the commanding officer’s private computer terminal and communication lines once the paint fumes finished dissipating next week.

Adams had the engineering deck nearly in hand, though there were certain pipes for the venting he was having a difficult time getting a hold of. Of course, the crew deck had been finished a month ago, but the supply crews were only just starting to restock the necessary medical and household supplies for whatever crew the  _ Normandy _ took on once it was officially released for duty. Cortez had finished up on the armory for the most part, and was now rushing to get the shuttle docking fixtures completed since they had finally decided what model the  _ Normandy _ would use.

EDI was still intransigent about answering anyone but Joker consistently. She almost seemed to only answer other people on a whim. Adams and Samantha, when they spoke about it well away from the ship, both agreed that she was probably an AI and that Joker was lying.

For his part, Adams had started trying to reason with her to get what he wanted. Samantha pretended she was just a normal VI. It was extremely embarrassing to think of some of the things she’d said where EDI could hear her, and even worse to think of some of the things she had said to EDI while still believing she was a VI.

Gods, so embarrassing.

At any rate, the ship was nearly completed, and she was running simple diagnostics to check the communications relays when there was a ping on the comms. Without looking at it, she reached over and connected, mind still focused on the compiling rates of her diagnostic.

“Traynor, here. What do you need?” she asked, and squeaked when a distinctive, deep voice answered her.

“I’m here to take the tour,” the unmistakable voice of Humanity’s first counselor answered.

“Oh, oh gosh,” Samantha stuttered. “I’ll get, let me get Adams on the line, please hold,” and slammed the end call button. “Fuck!”

Scrambling at the channels, she finally got the line to the engineering deck open. “Adams, Adams are you there?”

There was a muffled response, like he was underneath one of the coolant tanks or something, but she heard a “Yes.”

“Adams, sir, um, Admiral Anderson is here.”

There was a noise and a thunk.

“I said Admiral Anderson is here! He wants a tour!”

“Well then let him aboard, Traynor! I’ll be right up.”

“Right, right.” She cut the feed, staring at the console. Wait. “EDI, um, where is Admiral Anderson right now?”

“Admiral Anderson and Major Kaidan Alenko are both standing at the CIC access hatch.” EDI’s calm tone helped ground her.

She took a deep breath, and held it, before letting it out. “Right. Ok. It’s a tour Adams is in charge of tours. I just have to let them in. I can. I can handle this.” She quickly strode over to the access hatch, muttering, “You’d think I’d be used to meeting famous people by now, but nooooo.”

She was just glad Joker was down in Engineering with Adams so he and his guards couldn’t see her freak out. After over five months of working together they had enough dirt on her.

She quickly ran a hand through her hair and tugged at her BDU’s uselessly before hitting the access panel to unlock the outer hatch. While the containment cycle processed, she straightened her shoulders and tried to get into her military posture. “Ok,” she exhaled.

With that, the inner hatch swished open, and Admiral Anderson stepped through.

“Sir,” she attempted her snappiest salute. “Welcome aboard the  _ Normandy _ , sir.”

Anderson and Alenko both saluted back, Anderson adding, “Thank you, specialist.”

“Lieutenant Adams will be joining us shortly, sir, but for now I can show you around the CIC, if you’d like,” she added. “Or, I guess Major Alenko could? I’m not, um.”

“I believe Specialist Traynor would know more about the renovations of the command deck than anyone,” Alenko interceded with a smile.

“Right! Ok. Well, as you can see, all of the hardware has been fully updated,” she said, turning and leading them down to the navigation command. “The galaxy map and navigation has been purged and reinstalled according to Alliance guidelines, and updated to the most current technology. Broad communication collection and analysis can be performed both here and in the War Room, though the War Room, of course, offers enhanced security for outgoing communication.”

She led them over to the door to the secured suite and opened it. “In here we have enhanced security screening. Um, you need to have your biometrics measured and inputted to pass through the screening, which I’m sure you’ll have, ah. Beyond that is a secure conference room, and the War Room, of course, which is where the most secure information gathering and so on will take place. Also the quantum entanglement communication platform is through there, which offers untraceable, un-interceptable communication between the two ends of the unit.”

Anderson nodded along, not betraying any boredom, which Samantha was grateful for. The ding of the elevator thankfully came then, and Samantha pulled herself back into parade rest as Adams stepped out of the elevator and saluted.

Anderson saluted back, and said, “Greg! Good to see you.” He stuck out his hand.

“Good to see you, too, Dave.” Adams grinned and grabbed Anderson’s hand with a jovial shake. “Here to see the old bird, huh?”

“You know it,” Anderson said. Samantha shot a glance at Alenko, eyebrows raised. He shrugged.

“Traynor’s probably covered the bridge, I’m guessing,” Adams continued. “Let me show you around the rest of the ship.” They gave Samantha a casual dismissal and stepped back on the still open elevator.

Samantha heaved a huge sigh as the elevator door closed on the still chatting men. She didn’t make an ass of herself, right? But maybe she should edit down her little tour in case she ever has to give another one.

Well, there was still her diagnostics results to analyze, and she quickly got lost in running test clarifications on the feeds, forgetting there was even a VIP tour going on until the elevator dinged again, signalling their return.

“-so Shepard thinks they’ll be here soon, huh,” Adams was saying.

“Yes, her story hasn’t changed at all. Destroying the Alpha Relay was a delaying tactic, nothing more. She estimates she delayed them only by three to six months. As you can see, time is running short,” Anderson replied.

“Well, don’t worry about it, Admiral,” Adams said, his formal tone indicating the seriousness of his answer. “All the  _ Normandy _ needs at this point is some fine tuning. She’s ready to go in all other respects. They could attack tomorrow and she’d be in the air in less than five.”

“Good,” Anderson said. “Though I pray to God that won’t be necessary.” He nodded to Alenko. “Hopefully they can hold off until the official launch in two weeks, but if they attack sooner, Kaidan has been authorized as well to launch the  _ Normandy _ .” He walked to the command corridor leading to the exit, Adams and Alenko trailing him.

“And Shepard?” Adams asked.

Anderson looked down. “Officially? She’s still under house arrest, and allowing her to take command of the  _ Normandy _ would go against the Defense Committee’s orders. But, Adams, unofficially? If she’s the only one who can get to you, you know as well as I do she’s fit to take command.” He looked back up at Adams with steely resolve in his eye. “She’s probably the only one who can lead us to any sort of victory. If you need to, grab her and go.” He looked at Alenko. “That’s my official word on the matter for you as well, Major. If the reapers attack, get to the  _ Normandy _ , get Shepard, and go.”

Adams and Alenko both saluted, Alenko with more reluctance than Adams.

Anderson then turned and pinned Samantha under that intimidating gaze. “Specialist, you understand those orders, as well, correct?”

“H-Yes, sir, sir,” she squeaked, saluting.

“And I imagine I’ll have no need to give Joker those orders,” Anderson said. “Adams, I give you authority to reinstate Joker as pilot of the  _ Normandy _ in case of invasion before the official relaunch.”

“Of course, sir. Who else is qualified?” Adams said with a smile.

“Good.” Anderson paused, sweeping the CIC with a strange look on his face. “It’s been good to see the  _ Normandy _ again, even if it’s not the ship I remember. Keep her safe, you three.”

Adams and Alenko saluted, Samantha following after a second when she realised she was included in that statement. 

Anderson returned the salute. “You have your orders. Alenko, get that list down to the provisions office, then meet me in the morning at HQ. Adams, Traynor, good work.”

With that, he was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tbh I'm not entirely sure how Traynor would react to top brass, so I went with stuttery nerd because I like to write stuttery nerds sometimes


	6. Chapter 6

Two days later, Samantha paused while she was compiling the feeds in a new test pattern in the War Room. There was a massive influx of signals coming in. She picked one at random and listened.

A wave of ice swept through her veins. “EDI,” she whispered, “EDI, are these signals genuine?”

“Yes. Though you are currently running a test program, the program itself uses real data to test for effectiveness. You are currently collating the distress signals from several hundred Alliance vessels from the fleet stationed in orbit around Earth,” EDI said, her tone as unflappable as ever.

“Shit.” She sucked in a deep breath. “Shit. Where’s Joker? EDI, we’ll need--” A message sent directly to the Normandy on its top priority channel interrupted her.

“Normandy, this is Major K-” Static. “Hostile- -prep the Nor- -immediate take off-” the rest of the message was lost in static.

Before Samantha could even process  _ that _ , a basso rumble like a massive fog horn sounded, followed immediately by several explosions, which rocked the  _ Normandy _ in its moorings and sent Samantha stumbling against a guard railing.

“Reaper landing confirmed,” EDI intoned. 

“All crew, please find your secured positions and hold for evasive action.” Adams’ voice this time, over the intercom.

“Hold on to your butts, we’ve got to go,” Joker shouted next. 

“Fuck!” Samantha scrambled back to her feet. Her fingers immediately began dancing across the keyboard as alarms sounded throughout the Normandy. She tried isolating the signal from Kaidan, from the fleet, from anyone.

“E.T.A. one minute,  _ Normandy _ ,” Kaidan’s voice broke through. 

She hit the comm. “Joker, communication from Major Alenko! He’s on his way if we can wait for him.” Her fingers scrambled, data streams piling up. London, hit, Berlin, hit, New York, Los Angelos, Hong Kong, Mumbai--

“Got it, Traynor,” Joker broke through. “Try to clear the line, I think Anderson’s trying to contact us, too.” 

She swept all those extraneous data feeds away, merciless. Anderson, Anderson . . . Even locally, there was so much comm chatter, she had to use the voice recognition software.

“ _ Normandy _ , we have to reroute! N--” static. 

“Something’s jamming our communications,” Samantha exclaimed, shuffling through channels, all of them glitched or static.

“Brace for movement,” Joker said. “Alenko’s aboard, we’re heading out. Sam, keep searching those channels, we need to find Anderson!”

The whole ship rumbled with the impulse engines engaging. Samantha staggered again, but kept her footing this time, fingers flicking through the feeds, searching . . . “Aha!”

Anderson’s voice, again, “Normandy, this Anderson, do you read?”

“Patching it through,” Samantha said, grounding herself.

Kaidan, who was on the ship apparently, answered Anderson’s call. “Admiral, what’s your location?”

“By a downed gunship in the harbor. I’m activating its distress bea-” the signal corrupted almost as soon as she could steady it.

“Fuck!” Samantha tried to catch it again, but the interference was too great. 

“Anderson?” Kaidan called out.

“Downed gunship in the harbor,” Joker interrupted. “That’s enough for me.” And the ship’s engines surged beneath her feet.

Samantha could feel her heart rate kick up as the distant sound of explosions managed to filter through the intercom from the cargo bay. It was real, it was happening, it was, everything was--

“Specialist Traynor, I’m detecting a signal attempting to reach us on the long range relay,” EDI said. “I could use your assistance in isolating the signal.”

“Of course,” Samantha said, grasping immediately at the distraction. She turned to the feed, focusing on it with the kind of narrow minded intensity that she used to ignore her entirely different kind of anxiety during game tournaments when she was younger. 

The feed was distorted, difficult to isolate, exactly the kind of puzzle she needed right now. She barely even noticed when Joker announced that they were leaving atmo and when EDI said they had it isolated enough to show Joker, who then patched it through to Shepard (Shepard?). When the signal abruptly cut off, Samantha gasped.

“No, no no no,” she muttered. “Where’d it go, where?” She didn’t really register EDI attempting to calm her down.

“Sam!” Joker shouted, breaking her loop. “The communication’s over, you did it, it’s finished. Good job.”

“Good job?” she asked.

“Good job. That was Admiral Hacket, you know. We’re going to Mars. Take a breather, Sam, we’ll probably need you when the mission’s over, too.” Joker’s voice was somehow very calm, over the intercom. It helped, some.

Then Campbell was there, bracing her up. “Hey, specialist,” she said. “Let’s get you to the mess, alright?” 

Samantha looked up at her, barely aware until she focused on her face. Tears streaked down the younger woman’s face, her minimal makeup smudged and wrecked. “Oh, god,” Samantha whispered, then hugged her. “Oh, no. Oh, Campbell.” She could feel Campbell stiffen, and then hug back, comfort sharing comfort, and if either of them noticed the way the other was still crying, neither of them said anything.

When they left the War Room, they collected Westmoreland and several other of the dry dock crew on their way down to the mess. Cortez was down there, along with several other dry dock techs, and Adams, and a hulking tattooed man Samantha had never seen before, who seemed to be shadowing Cortez. It was only about fifteen people, but it felt like quite a crowd.

But also like no one at all.

“Alright, crew,” Adams said after a moment, quieting the small gathering of people. “We are now the official crew of the  _ Normandy _ , at least until we hit the Citadel.” He was silent a moment, staring at the ground. “I . . . I probably don’t need to tell you this, but, the Reapers have arrived. This is it.”

Samantha clenched her fists together, staring fixed at the wall over Adams’ shoulder. 

“When we reach the Citadel, you’ll have the choice to stay and crew the  _ Normandy  _ officially, or get off and find a posting in the Alliance dockyard there,” he continued. “If you choose to stay, you’ll be allowed a short shore leave to the Citadel to pick up any personal effects you need. Please keep in mind Alliance regulations regarding per person weight limits for personal items. Regardless of your choice, thank you for your service.” He saluted them, then turned and walked around the elevator column out of sight.

The crew was quiet, more than one group huddled together against each other. Several people broke off to go to the crew cabins or the lounges, until there were only about seven people left. 

Samantha noted that Westmoreland and Campbell were holding hands again. She took a seat by them, next to Cortez and his companion, out of habit more than anything.

Whispered conversations started slowly.

“Hey, Esteban,” the large, tattooed stranger whispered, “glad you made it through. You doing alright?”

“Vega,” Cortez sighed. “Yeah, yeah I’m, well I’m not fine, but I’m coping. You?”

“I’m pissed as hell,” Vega said, a little too loudly. “I can’t believe she would just leave Anderson behind like that.”

“She didn’t leave him behind, Vega,” Cortez whispered back, laying a hand on one thickly corded arm. “He ordered her to go. There’s a difference.”

“Some difference,” Vega growled. “This is bullshit. It doesn’t feel right to leave Earth like this.”

“You heard Admiral Hackett, though.” Cortez ran a hand over his scalp. “Get to Mars, get that data, then get to the Citadel. It’s not like the  _ Normandy _ can take down every reaper on Earth alone. Fuck I don’t think we could take even one down.” He turned to her and said, “Samantha, you’ve got a better head for trivia than I do. How many ships did it take to bring down Sovereign?”

“Sovereign?” She blinked slowly. “You mean the geth attack on the Citadel three years ago? It took the whole fleet.”

Cortez nodded. “See, Jimmy? We need whatever help we can get. That’s our mission now.”

Vega crossed his arm, glaring at the table. “I’d have rather stayed on Earth, stood and fought,” he said.

“ETA to Mars, five minutes,” EDI’s calm tone interrupted. “Ground crew, please report back to the cargo bay for arming.”

“That’s my cue,” Vega said, standing up. “Time to see if those piloting lessons are still fresh, eh Esteban?”

Cortez squinted up at him, frowning. “Wouldn’t you rather have me fly the shuttle?”

“Nah, you stay here, I got this,” Vega replied, and strode off to report for duty.

Traynor stayed in the mess for a half hour before reporting back up to the CIC. She needed some data to analyze, something to distract her from events. She stared down at the feeds, idly sorting them based on signal strength, wavelength, seed rate, whatever, not even paying attention to the results. 

She very studiously avoided listening to any of the audio files.

“The ground team is back on board,” EDI announced.

“Now en route to the Chiron Relay,” Joker responded.

“Samantha, I could use your assistance in isolating the QEC signals,” EDI said. “It appears there is some cross interference due to the destruction of several of the entanglement units adjacent to Hackett’s feed. I will need you to remove the components that have been made nonfunctional to clean up the signal.”

“Right,” Samantha said, right. She resolutely ignored what it meant that those paired units were no longer functional.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> James doesn't have much to say about Shepard yet, he's too angry.


	7. Chapter 7

They arrived at the Citadel with little fanfare. The crew was released from duty in shifts, with Samantha somehow landing on the first group. She was just preparing to leave when an asari came striding through the CIC to the bridge hatch.

She paused on her way through the CIC, then turned toward Samantha. “You’re the communications specialist?” 

Samantha nodded hesitantly. “Yes, Samantha Traynor, um . . .”

The asari’s lips quirked. “Liara T’Soni. Listen, I know this may seem like an odd request, but I need you to give clear and untapped priority channels to the array I’m going to set up in Miranda’s old office.”

Samantha shook her head. “Miranda? I’m afraid I don’t know what you are referring to.”

“The XO’s office on the crew deck, then,” she said. “I’m going to need it for my own data mining operations.”

“Oh.” Samantha frowned. “Why-”

“I know you have full access to all of the Alliance’s networks,” the asari said. “But I have access to other information sources, and it would be beneficial for all of us if we can pool our resources.”

“Of course,” Samantha said, still slightly put off. “Once you have the equipment, I can set up your channels, Ms. T’Soni. But for now, I have several things I have to pick up on the Citadel.”

T’Soni frowned, clearly irritated, but nodded, and continued through to the access hatch. She called a goodbye to Joker, and ducked out as he waved her off.

“Goddamn she’s different,” Joker said offhandedly as Samantha also came even with the hatch. “Can’t believe that’s the same cute little asari Shepard rescued off Therum.”

Samantha hummed. “She seems very driven,” she said diplomatically.

“Oh, yeah, sure. She’s that alright. Be prepared to work your ass off when she gets back, by the way, she’s probably going to have, like, fifty monitors to set off,” he said. “She was a big time info broker on Ilium, so like, that’s a thing.”

“Right.” Samantha studied the back of his head and rubbed her arm. She had a feeling there was more to it than that. “Well, I’m going to head out now. Do, do you need anything?” she asked more to be polite than anything else.

Joker swung his chair around and smirked at her. “It’s nice of you to offer,” he said, “but I ordered most of my shit online already. I feel like I should make a dirty joke, here, but I just don’t have it in me right now.” He swung back around, giving her the same back handed wave he gave Liara. “Have fun, specialist.”

When she got back, the ship was bustling with quiet activity as new and old crew members shuffled around familiarizing themselves with their stations, and settling into the crew deck. She got her assigned locker and bunk assignments, and prepped a brief virtual tour for Shepard before settling in for her assigned sleep cycle.

After attempting to see Shepard in the morning and being told the Commander was currently unavailable, she spent her first morning as official lead communications specialist of the Normandy helping Liara to set up her own information collection and analysis hub.

“This array is just incredible,” she commented as she pulled more cable couplings through an access panel on the inner wall of the XO’s quarters.

“I am aware,” Liara said simply, feeding terminal data into the glowing orb of her personal VI. “I’m going to have to bring every resource I possibly can to help Shepard succeed,” she added, “and you should consider it, too. I’ve heard from Joker that you’re also a talented data analyst.”

“I mean, I have some skills, I guess,” Samantha deflected. “I was mostly just a lab tech, actually, with the R and D department. This is my first, um, active assignment.”

Liara looked up at her, an oddly sympathetic smile on her face. “I suppose I can understand your nervousness more than I realised, then,” she said. “I hadn’t had much experience with war myself when I first started working with Shepard.”

“Really?” Samantha looked at the asari curiously. “Joker had mentioned something along those lines, but I hadn’t realized he was being serious.”

“Joker being serious is always a strange and terrifying thing,” Liara joked. “But yes, I was just an archaeologist three years ago. It’s strange, it feels so long ago. So much has changed, so quickly. Honestly, I, I never would have considered information brokering if I had never met Shepard, and not just because I would likely be dead.”

“Really?” Samantha asked as she plugged in another bank of monitors. “You were an archaeologist?”

“Yes, I studied Prothean technology,” Liara acknowledged. “For that reason, and because of my mother’s activity, I became a person of interest for both Shepard and Saren. As it turns out, extensive knowledge of Prothean technology proved vital in bringing him down.” She finished typing something into Glyph’s interface, then closed the program. “That, more than anything else, showed me the value having access to a wide array of information can provide an organization. When Shepard was killed, I . . . it changed the course of my whole life.” She stood and joined Samantha on the other side of the room. “That’s a rather dour subject I’d prefer not to dwell on, however,” she said. “This is the last of the systems at this point,” she added. “Thank you very much for your assistance, Specialist.”

“Oh, it was no trouble,” Samantha said. “I’ll just leave you to get this all, whatever it is you plan to do with it, then. Let me know if you need anything else.”

She spent the rest of the morning investigating what resources she could allocate to Liara, and also what resources were available for her own use now that the  _ Normandy _ was officially back on active duty. The Alliance resources were depressingly limited to what she’d had access to while the ship was in dry dock, but when she realised she now also had access to specter resources as a member of an official council specter’s crew, she nearly whooped aloud in the CIC.

Specter status entitled Shepard to _ so much stuff _ . Samantha could barely wipe the grin off her face as she started digging through the various programs and equipment she could now afford to requisition.

It kept her occupied all the way until EDI notified her that Shepard was now available for the tour.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hadn't originally planned for Liara to be here, but then she was like, hey I got all this shit I need help setting up, come on. so I was like, FINE.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy shit, a chapter without dialogue! but I didn't want to be too recursive here because the rest of the romance is in the game, haha. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it! any excuse to write just excessive amounts of dialogue is a good excuse.
> 
> special thanks to all those let's players and the mass effect wikia, it made researching for this a lot easier than replaying the whole game myself
> 
> and now, the verdict:

Samantha hadn’t been sure what to expect of Shepard when she finally met her for the first time. She’d heard so much about her; about her strength, her force of will and personality, her charisma, her focus and impressive ability to see any mission through no matter how difficult.

None of this was enough to prepare Samantha for the woman in reality. Shepard looked tired, worried, but determination still shone through her. She was also surprisingly warm. No one had ever told Samantha about how calm and reassuring the commander could be. Shepard even listened to her wax enthusiastic about extrapolating from data to construct real time GUIs without censure.

It was nice, how quickly Shepard made her feel at ease, as well. Even her matter of fact revelation that EDI was, in fact, an AI was made with the same lack of judgment for Samantha’s gullibility in falling for Joker’s line about her being a VI. 

Shepard listened patiently as Samantha guided her through the ship’s layout, as if she hadn’t spent a year already living aboard it, and then later that afternoon, met her again in the CIC and talked to her even more.

It was nice. It was . . . 

Oh no.

It was the beginning of a crush.


End file.
